Lonesometown
by HardlyFatal
Summary: Series of oneshots and drabbles showcasing all the unrequited love in Soul Society. Lots of introspection, angst, and inebriation.
1. Population: One

**Lonesometown**  
Population: One 

Rangiku liked to go to a specific saloon, when drinking alone got to be too pathetic even for her and her melancholy. It was in the 47th district of South Rukongai, not too sleazy but not too proper, either. A place a girl could get good and pissed without having to worry about being hit on or thrown out.

The bartender asked her once a night what a pretty girl like her was doing, drinking herself halfway to a stupor. She never answered, just grinned blearily and held out her glass for a refill. Even if it weren't classified, Rangiku doubted there was a way to put into words the sorrow-shock-horror she felt at Gin's betrayal. There was a raw and primal baseness to it all that defied any attempts she might have made at description.

If she closed her eyes, she still saw the way he went suddenly, instantly still when she'd grabbed his wrist. Narrow wrist, bony and deceptively frail-feeling, he'd quivered once as his body registered the remembered imprint of her touch upon it. How many times, when they were children, had they made contact with each other? No way to count—the number would be endless.

There had been a time when Rangiku was as familiar with Gin's body as with her own. The year before he'd left Rukongai to attend the shinigami academy, the year her mind had caught up with the burgeoning, almost-adult promise of her body. Gin had surprised her with a kiss, one day, and a longing she hadn't realized she'd always harbored for him had broken free.

They'd made love with a fervency, a potent concentration that had threatened to shake them apart, and afterward they'd laughed, embarrassed. It didn't stop them from doing it again, and again, until every secret had been routed out, until Rangiku felt that every blood vessel and every nerve ending had been revealed to each other.

It hadn't kept him from leaving, however, and his going had hurt her like the loss of a limb. And like any other amputee, sometimes she still felt him, even though he wasn't there.

By the time she, too, was in the academy, he'd graduated. And when she'd entered the ranks of shinigami, he was working his way up the chairs in division five, far too lofty and busy to spend time with her, though sometimes he would look at her—actually open his eyes and _look_ at her—with real regret.

Then she was vice-captain of division ten, and he captain of division three, and though now there was more time and opportunity, Rangiku felt herself uneasy in his presence. He wasn't who he had been; something had changed in him, had sharpened and hardened, had doubled and redoubled the blade within until he was little else _but_ the blade.

Gone was the compassion that had made him save her, gone the generosity that spurred him to share his precious food to keep her alive. His mischievous sense of humor had given way to one of malice, and the edge of cruelty she'd always known lived inside him had been honed until it glittered, blue and bright, for all to see.

Confused, unnerved, Rangiku had fled from him, instead of confronting him. She wondered now if it would have made any difference. She wondered if she could trust her perception of events, those fateful moments before Gin had ascended into the sky to join the Hollows, their enemy. He had gone so still, except for the trembling, and his skin had warmed against her fingers.

Was there anything she could have done to prevent his defection with Aizen-taichou? Rangiku felt buffeted by remorse, by a sense of fury at her own impotence. If she'd gone to him, had ignored her discomfort with the changes in him, had been stronger and more insistent—

But no. A man is responsible for his own destiny, and Gin had always possessed a part of him that craved troublemaking. It was her own shortcoming that she'd underestimated the lengths to which he'd go in indulging it. His trickster agenda had meshed with the grandiose notions of Aizen-taichou, and that was that.

His parting words were what haunted her most of all. His grin—for once in a long time, not a smirk—had been genuine, and sad, as he'd told her that he wouldn't have minded being her prisoner just a little longer. Memories had crowded her, pressing in like a persistent throng, ever since.

Memories of him beneath her as they fucked, her hair falling around them so they were wrapped in a soft, private cocoon, her hands on his wrists pinning him down—and his letting her. It had pleased him to allow her the assumption of control and they both knew it was only by his forbearance, nothing more.

It had been no different, on the cliff. He could have broken free, could have fought her, could have killed her. Gin was more powerful than she, and always had been, but he'd once again placed himself in her hands, to do with as she would.

Rangiku sipped her drink, reveling in the sting of it on her tongue, and understood at last that, to the end, their dynamic had been intact. If he'd wanted her to stop him, he'd have come to her, would have placed himself in her hands and done what she wished. But he'd kept to secrecy and plots, to treachery and deception.

The last hurrah of his submission to her had been out of a sense of nostalgia, of that Rangiku was convinced, because she couldn't bear to think he might love her still (if indeed he ever had).

_No,_ she thought with something akin to panic, _he didn't love me. He didn't, he didn't didn'tdidn't…_

"Rangiku." Her captain's voice cut through the alcoholic haze fueling her distress, and she turned to see him staring down at her, face exasperated.

The burn of the booze in her stomach was matched by the ache in her chest. She tossed back the last watery dregs of her drink and felt her mood shift yet again.

"Heeeeeeey, taichou!" she greeted him, waggling her empty glass in his direction. "What're you doing here? How'd you find me?" Then she peered more closely at him. "Aren't you a little young to be in a place like this?'

Thunking her glass on the scarred surface of the bar, Rangiku lurched to her feet and tried to steer her captain toward the door. "C'mon, lil fella," she urged. "Let's get you home and into bed! 'S'late! Beddy-bye time!"

Hitsugaya pried her hand off his shoulder. "You know very well that I'm over thirty years old," he snapped. "And you also know I found you by following the feel of your spiritual pressure." He slung an arm around her waist and began to remove her from the establishment. "Are you always this stupid when you drink, or is tonight a special occasion?"

"Tonight's special!" she declared, head lolling back on her neck as she stared at the sky above. It was an overcast night, the clouds looking dingy and worn, and Hitsugaya was unable to share in his vice-captain's fascination for them.

"That's where he went, yaknow," she confided in his ear, sending a gust of booze-scented breath toward him.

Hitsugaya scrunched his nose and averted his face, sighing as his suspicions were confirmed. "You're still torn up over him. Hinamori's still worked up about Aizen. Am I alone in failing to understand their attraction?" He sounded very irritated, and Rangiku swung her head around to look at him.

"But taichouuuuu," she protested, "you don't know what it's like, to be in, in thrall to a car-seat-matic……. charsimatic…"

"Charismatic!" he gritted out.

"Thassit!" she agreed amiably. "A… _that_… sort of person. They just kind of hook you in!" Here, she illustrated her point by curling her fingers into claws. "And you can't escape. They have you forever."

He sent her an inscrutable look, but she was looking at the dirty sky again and missed it. "Yeah," he said at last. "I have no idea what it's like."

"Don't worry," Rangiku told him in what she was sure was a very encouraging way, and backed it up by mussing his hair. "One day, you'll grow up and find some nice girl and you'll give her kisses and see inside her skin, and go away for days and days, until you come back, and she'll love you so much, even when she shouldn't…"

She stopped then, stopped dead, right in the middle of the street, wiggling free of his grasp and staring blankly at the sky once more. "Oh, _Gin_," she said, and Hitsugaya didn't think he'd ever heard so much sorrow in just two words, ever.

Then she passed out. He caught her before she hit the ground, slinging her over his shoulder. It was better, this way; now he could flash-step back to the Seireitei much faster. In short order, he was dumping her onto her futon in her quarters in the 10th division headquarters.

The room smelled stale, with an underlying tang of spilled liquor and grief, and he threw open the window shutters before departing. In the feeble light that had struggled past the clouds, Hitsugaya watched Rangiku for a moment, face impassive.

Then he left.

He understood far more than she thought.


	2. Population: Two

**Lonesometown**  
**Population: Two**

"I don't believe this," Rangiku fumed, and thumped her glass on the scarred surface of the bar for emphasis. "That little shrimp's got some nerve. I'm 134 years old! How dare he insist I have a babysitter!"

Her companion's snort of amusement swiftly faded when she turned her ire to him. "And you!" she exclaimed, making him wince. "In my case, at least, I can't refuse because it's my captain! But you… you _are_ the captain. How can you let your lieutenant boss you around like this?"

"Well," Shunsui said cheerfully, "I could tell you it was because no sane person dares go against Nanaochan— and it would be true, even— but I assume you'd like the _real_ reason." He paused for dramatic effect, glancing hither and yon to see if he had anyone's attention. Which of course he _did_, since he was not only a captain but equally loud in both attire and volume.

"I let Nanaochan boss me around," he said, "because I _like_ it." And to make sure his meaning was inescapably clear, he leaned closer to Rangiku and waggled his eyebrows suggestively.

If he was looking for her to be shocked by his little fetish, he was going to be disappointed; some of the things she'd done with Gin over the years made Shunsui's games pale in comparison. She just huffed out a breath of exasperation and turned back to her booze. "Well, I don't. They've got no right."

Shunsui polished off his sake and gave his empty saucer an exuberant wave to indicate his desire for a refill. "They worry, your captain and my Nanaochan. They _care_ about us. It's so sweet, don't you think?"

Rangiku only grunted around her mouthful of bourbon. "I don't know why you need to drink so much," she grumbled at last. "What problems can you possibly have that compare to my pressing and persistent need to get trashed? Huh? Did _you_ have a childhood friend-cum-lover neglect you for decades, then desert you publicly after secretly conspiring to destroy Soul Society? _Huh_?"

"Not so much, no," he admitted. "But I've been _perishing_ of love for my beautiful Nanaochan for many years now, and I still haven't gotten anywhere with her." He stared down at his newly refilled saucer as if advice and encouragement were forthcoming from its depths.

"Why do you _do_ that?" she snapped. Banging her glass down on the bar succeeded in sloshing a third of it onto her hand. "Calling her 'beautiful' and 'lovely'. She thinks you're making fun of her when you say that."

The goofy smile didn't fade from Shunsui's face. "Why would she think that?" he asked, his voice both slurred and puzzled.

"W-well," she replied after draining her glass and thumping it at the bartender for a refill, "because you call _every_ woman you see 'lovely'. And also because she's, well, she's not a beautiful woman." It was the truth, and had to be spoken; Nanao had many positive traits, but beauty was not one of them.

Shunsui stared at her a long moment, and then he burst out laughing. "Oh, you mean on the _outside_," he said at last, waving his hand with supreme negligence.

Now it was Rangiku's turn to stare. Then she burst into tears, and flung herself at him, sobbing noisily.

"_Yare, yare_," he murmured, patting her back with one hand while sipping at his saucer. "What's all this?"

"That's so romantic," she wept. "That you'd love Nanao even if she were ugly! Even if she looked like, like, like Oomaeda-fukutaichou!"

"Well," Shunsui hedged, looking uncomfortable, "let's not push it that far." With a last pat-pat, he put her back on her own stool and motioned for the bartender to fill her glass, then watching as she chugged half of it down in one gulp. "I don't care if they're ugly, but I like my women to look like _women_."

Rangiku leered at him, swaying atop her stool. "And how do you like your men?" she asked with a laugh.

"I like my men to be women, too" he replied gravely, then dissolved into his own fit of giggles. "Nothing like a woman!" he declared to those around him, all of whom (besides Rangiku) ignored him completely. "With their—" he held his hands in front of his chest, as if cupping breasts, "so soft, and their—" here, he turned his hand palm-up, his middle finger curling upward, "so welcoming and warm and—"

It took Rangiku a moment to understand what that gesture could be, but when she did, her eyes went wide. "Shunsui-taichou," she began, "you should probably lower your voice, now—"

"Excuse me," the bartender said at this juncture. "I've been instructed by Ise-fukutaichou to cut you off when you started talking about sex." And he removed the glass and saucer from their vicinity.

Rangiku wanted to get belligerent—a bit of bloodshed would do her good, she felt—but Shunsui was feeling more circumspect. The concept of sex, even theoretical, put him in the mood to be scrupulous about his enforced duty at this bar, and he hooked an arm around Rangiku's waist, then hoisted her bodily from the building.

Outside, the night was both smoky and greasy from all the oil lamps burning to light Rukongai's 47th district. Combined with the prickle of bourbon still on her tongue, it tasted gritty, and the urge for violence abruptly drained from her, replaced with exhaustion.

Feeling the fight go out of her, Shunsui released her, then steadied her when she swayed and nearly tumbled to the street. Their walk back to Seireitai was accomplished in near-silence, broken only by the occasional hiccup (Rangiku) or giggle (Shunsui). She was very glad for his solid form beside her, because she spent most of the walk leaning against him for balance and marveling how he kept his footing when he was easily as drunk as she.

"Experience, my dear Rangikuchan," he warbled when she asked, his face so close their noses bumped. "I'm very, very, very, very old. Been getting drunk for many, many, many years. What sort of shinigami would I be if I couldn't make it back to my quarters, I ask you? Hm? Hm?"

"Your caliber of shinigami is a topic best left undiscussed," said a cool voice, and they both swung their heads around to see Nanao herself standing before them. "You were so loud, you woke me up from a sound sleep."

Rangiku blinked, surprised to find herself in the courtyard of the eighth division headquarters. "Oh," she said indistinctly, and gave a discrete burp. "I'm sorry, Nanao-chan."

"I'm not!" Shunsui exclaimed gaily. "Now I get to see my Nanaochan one more time before going to bed!" His eyes rounded in concern. "But first, we have to get Rangikuchan home to her own division, where she'll be as safe and snug as a bug in a rug! Heh. Nanaochan, I rhymed." He grinned stupidly at her, as if he'd accomplished some amazing feat.

She sighed. "Yes, taichou. Come with me, please, both of you."

She linked arms with them and made her way toward the tenth division, where she delivered Rangiku into the hands of the first few people who answered her firm knocking at the door. Then it was time to trudge back to her own division with her captain slung over her, blowing gusts of booze-scented breath in her ear and mumbling affectionate but nonsensical phrases like, "Nanaochan's the cutest little koala I ever saw, but she eats far too many eucalyptus leaves." Nanao didn't even want to know what in the world that could mean in Shunsui's sake-soaked world.

"Rangikuchan thinks I'm romantic," he told her proudly at one point, poking his own chest and then her shoulder for emphasis.

"Because you refrained from molesting her?" Nanao replied dryly, bracing herself to haul him up the stairs toward his quarters.

"No, because I told her I love Nanaochan no matter what she looks like!" He stopped, then, and no amount of tugging could get him to budge. "Even if you _did_ look like Oomaeda-fukutaichou, I would be devoted to you. Granted, it would take some getting used to… perhaps I could buy you a big floppy hat to cover your face… aaaaahhhh!"

He shouted, of course, because she had dropped him, allowing him to fall down the few steps they'd managed to climb.

"Nanaochan is so severe with me," he mumbled, gazing blearily up at her from the floor. "And this time, not in the good way. I've very, very old, you know. You should be more gentle with me."

"You wouldn't know what to do if I were gentle with you," she told him, hoisting him to his feet once more, but the bite was gone from her words. She sounded confused, and perhaps a little resigned.

"Oh, but I _would_," he insisted. "I've been thinking about Nanaochan for a very, very, very long time, you know. In every situation… every position… aaaaaaahhhhhhhh!"

Now she'd dropped him in the hallway outside his room. "I really do not know what to do with you," she said tiredly. "Just… go to bed, taichou. I will see you tomorrow."

He used the doorjamb to stand once more and lifted a hand, surprisingly steady, to her cheek. "Whatever you decide, my lovely Nanaochan, I am yours," he said, and sounded almost sober. She summoned a thin smile, and left.

Alone in his room, Shunsui shucked his kit and flung himself without ceremony into bed. The euphoria of inebriation was fading, leaving him with a sort of sodden fuzziness that was not entirely unpleasant. He decided that Rangiku-chan was a good drinking partner, if a little maudlin. But he bet with practice, she'd become more fun. It would just take time.

Fortunately, time was something one had in great quantities when one was dead. The idea made him laugh, and he was still smiling when, finally, he passed out.


End file.
